Trained workers required to create jobs in Florida

July 15, 2013|By Donna Gehrke-White, Sun Sentinel

Florida needs skilled workers in all sectors so the state can create more than 900,000 new jobs in the next seven years to achieve an unemployment level of 6 percent or less, the Florida Chamber Foundation said in a statement Friday.

By 2020, nearly 60 percent of jobs will require at least a two-year degree, the foundation said, citing research conducted by another nonprofit, the Lumina Foundation.

That "means our [state's] high school graduation rate is of critical importance," said the Florida Chamber Foundation, a nonprofit business-led research group.

On Sept. 26, the foundation plans to host a statewide Solutions Summit to discuss the state's growing need for skilled workers and how the public educational system can help.

The foundation said Florida's high school graduation rate has risen from what it called a "paltry" 56.5 percent rate in 2002 to a more promising 75.5 percent in 2012.

"There is still a lot of room for improvement, but the trend is definitely in the right direction," the foundation said.

High school graduates are 28 percent more likely to be in the workforce, earn 38 percent more on average, and exhibit an unemployment rate 44 percent lower than those without a high school diploma, foundation staffers added.

Jane Adams, University of Florida vice president for University Relations and a Florida Chamber Foundation past chair, looks at the graduation rates with a hopeful eye.

"We definitely view the path as a positive for not just higher education, but the state as a whole," she said. "We see greater competition for admission to UF, and this means more and more talented students are attending colleges and universities all over the state. We definitely see an emergence in Gainesville of growth in high-tech jobs, and that process begins years in advance, in both the elementary and secondary education arenas."

For more information about the Florida Chamber Foundation and its Sept. 26 Solutions Summit, go to TheFloridaScorecard.com